A new direction

As Facebook became more of an obsession with me, I have been neglectful of this blog - a blog that is in its 13th year.

When I first started posting here, my aim was to share quirky and beautiful things about Spokane. I also wanted to share in some of my adventures.

Over the years, it seems like I have had less to say on Spokanarama and more on Facebook. I have had other creative distractions - books of poetry, crocheting, painting, ukulele songs and Haiku Friday. I was promoted at work and have stepped up my professional game. Believe me, there are a lot of other things going on that I haven't written about, and won't write about for a while.

One of the things I tried to do, was to steer the best I could away from political rants. I didn't want to turn anyone "off" by what I had to say. We are all living in our own bubbles of reality and I didn't want to burst anyone's bubble.

Here's the thing, though, I am reflecting upon after this election. I expended a lot of time countering fake news stories and memes from my Republican friends. I appealed to any sense of self-credibility that they wanted to safeguard by documenting and providing proof for the errors in their postings. But, I quickly found out that they were willing to risk their self-credibility, hell - throw it away, in order to win one for their team. My efforts meant nothing. Just as much as when Trump was confronted with videos of him showing things that he swore he never said, my friends could do the same. We live in a post-truth world. The end justifies the means and the mean lying.

I am weaning myself off of Facebook proselytizing. I am going to put more effort back into Spokanarama. I want my posts to be more personal and, I hate to say it, political. My world is political and so is yours. My future pension, my current pay, my safety, my health, my life span, my work, my freedom are derivatives of policies, of politics, of funding, of Supreme Court justices and the law. So are yours. You can root for your team but when your team shows up to punch you in the face, you should stop rooting for them. But, some of you won't.

I will switch over to more Instagram or Twitter posts. Some of these will be automatically forward to Facebook.

I want to delve more into long form statements. I want to invite you along and I will ask for your participation. I might even resurrect some podcasting.

I look forward to being more personal, more political, more participative and more thoughtful in the future on Spokanarama. I have some statements to make and surprises coming, probably in the next year. I will need your friendship and support. Please count on mine. Thanks! John "Spokanarama" Griffith.